Haskell: Walberg votes against the middle class

Democratic congressional candidate Kurt Haskell has taken aim at the voting record of his opponent, incumbent Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Tipton.

"All of (Walberg's) votes are bad," Haskell said. "Nearly every one of his votes is against the middle class."

Haskell, an attorney from Newport in Monroe County who has never before sought elective office, faces Walberg in the Nov. 6 election for the 7th District congressional seat, which includes Lenawee County and all or parts of six other counties.

Haskell also described the election as a contest about economic class.

— Walberg's vote against a bill holding down the interest rate on student loans.

— Repeated Walberg votes to repeal the Affordable Care Act or funding for parts of it.

— Walberg's vote for the defense appropriations bill, which included provisions about detention of suspected terrorists.

Haskell is especially critical of Walberg's vote for the budget proposed by Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis. who is now the Republican candidate for vice president.

"His worst vote in my opinion is his vote on March 29 for the Ryan budget," Haskell said.

The Ryan budget, which passed the House but not the Senate, would change Medicare in 10 years from a single-payer, government-sponsored insurance plan into a payment support — or voucher — system that gives seniors a set amount with which to buy insurance from companies on an insurance exchange. Medicare would be allowed to be on the exchange.

The Ryan budget also would slash funding for Medicaid, the government-paid health insurance for the poor, and turn it into a state block grant. The bill also cuts the top tax rate from 35 percent to 25 percent, and collapses all the other tax rates into one, 10 percent, category.

"There's a dramatic tax cut for millionaires," Haskell said.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, Ryan's budget would reduce all defense and discretionary spending — essentially everything except Medicare, Medicaid, a children's health program and Social Security — to 3.75 percent of gross domestic product by 2050. That spending in 2011 was 12.5 percent of gross domestic product, and defense spending alone has not been lower than 3 percent of GDP any year since World War II, the CBO says.

That has led critics to argue that the budget would effectively eliminate all federal government programs except major health programs, Social Security and defense.

"What it is is a right-wing extremist budget targeting the poor and the middle class," Haskell said.

Commenting on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's now famous statements about the 47 percent of Americans who do not pay any federal income tax seeing themselves as government-dependent victims, Haskell said: "I think that just sheds some light on the mentality of the Republican Party and how it feels about citizens who are less fortunate. These are the sort of beliefs that are behind the Ryan budget."

He believes he will be helped if voters come out in force to vote for president Obama, Haskell said.Haskell said he would seek a balanced budget by cutting defense spending to 2.3 percent of gross domestic product, close tax loopholes and lift the $110,000 income cap for Social Security taxes, and supports president Obama's call to raise taxes on income over $250,000.

He would make no other cuts, Haskell said.

Haskell has challenged Walberg to seven debates, one in each county in the district, but Walberg has refused to talk about a debate schedule until Haskell renounces statements he made about the attempted bombing of Northwest Flight 253 as it approached Detroit Metro airport on Christmas 2009.

Haskell, who was on that flight, has said he believes the U.S. government was involved and supplied would-be Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab an intentionally defective bomb.

Haskell, who did extensive interviews about the incident with the radio program "InfoWars," bases his suspicions on things he saw at the airport in Amsterdam, where he boarded the flight, and after passengers were taken off the flight and made to wait in a room at Detroit Metro.

The bomb, carried by Abdulmutallab in his underwear, did not explode, but caught fire, burning Abdulmutallab, who later was sentenced to life in prison.

"I will never renounce my eyewitness account," Haskell said.

His views are not "anti-American," as Walberg's campaign has charged, Haskell said.

Haskell said Walberg is using his statements about the attempted bombing to avoid debating him.

"I want to make this what it's really about, the middle class versus the ultra-rich," Haskell said.